what's unfolding currently in japan thank you. well now let's cross to another of our correspondents who is reporting from moscow we go to our teams that you've got going all. you got can you just tell us that the latest reaction we're getting from the society of moscow. well everybody is at the moment is just trying to assess the situation there in japan and it's really hard to establish the scale of the devastation by this horrific disaster because events are still continuing to on falls russia has offered its help to japan in fact six jets of russia's emergencies ministry are really to deliver rescuers and doctors and medical supplies including a mobile hospital to japan the only thing needed is a request from japanese authorities these jets have been on standby since friday on the order of the russian president.

of course were really to help our neighbors in overcoming these threats of this severe earthquake i state of emergency has also been declared on our soil on the coral islands in the seattle region were all necessary measures must also be taken to prevent damage or loss of life but tsunami has already reached our shores and we must all be consolidated it's time now ordering the emergencies minister to present a plan of assistance to japan. russia has the experience in dealing with both earthquakes especially in the coral islands which are right very in japan's neighborhood located just several miles away from its territory so they have been hit by earthquakes before and so does moscow have the experience in dealing with a nuclear disaster is to be churn or will nuclear catastrophe in one thousand nine hundred six which you were just talking about so. events are still unfolding. a

lot of help and international help will be needed so for these jets or weeding the only thing needed is a request from japanese authorities. ok well the thank you very much. reporting there from moscow thank you. and again just a quick reminder of breaking news at this hour at least four people have reportedly been injured following a get a reported explosion near the fukushima daiichi power plant in japan and earlier as the japanese a nuclear safety commission had said that there are fears of a possible meltdown at those plants all radioactivity there has risen by twenty times it seems that the outer structure of one of four buildings of the plant is no longer there again that the government official will be giving is now giving a press conference to address exactly what's going on we can see white smoke coming

from fukushima plant people are waiting for an explanation as to what exactly is going on with thousands of residents have been moved and there are fears the prime minister had expressed fears that a leak could occur at a second a plant nearby five reactors in two plants in fukushima in the north east of the country have been in a state of emergency it has been and that high alert since friday's record eight point nine magnitude earthquake resulted in the damage of the malfunction of the cooling system of these power plants which is now the cause of worry why it is in a state of emergency nuclear state of emergency and now around the of the city within the vicinity of the nuclear power plants about fifty one thousand people have been have reportedly been evacuated to safety now there are reports of an explosion that occurred white smoke coming out of coming from the a fukushima plant again we're waiting for an explanation from the spokesman who is

giving a. press conference well just to give you an idea on be a death toll coming from the earthquake the tsunami and now the official death toll is at one thousand but this is expected to rise according to the local television there it's at one thousand but many more are reported missing and are feared dead and once again you're looking at pictures of the fukushima plant billowing white smoke there unclear as of the moment where exactly with the end of the plant it's coming from but we have been reporting that the cooling system has malfunctioned since the earthquake friday afternoon in japan so that earthquake has resulted in this damage to the cooling systems mala functioning and this is why the government has issued this state of emergency alert fearing a possible fearing fearing

a possible catastrophe here the reading levels have been reportedly a one thousand times more than normal level significantly higher than what it should be people living around there have already been evacuated at least most of them according to japan's nuclear safety commission well though over russia's far east is situated very close to japan it's to the north and it may potentially be affected by any radiation if it does the you know we have a correspondent there joining us live a couple you know great short on the ground there for us now again so how in the region is quite close to japan how are people reacting to initial reports of an explosion of possible radiation leak what's the reaction. now to this is actually the closest regional russia to japan and typical shima the place where the nuclear power plant tragedy is now unfolding well it's not in the immediate

proximity of course and it's not yet clear how serious consequence. as of a possible radioactive contamination for the local residents could be but what we're saying is that the accident at fukushima and this recent explosion is definitely adding to local residents' worries will shortly out to japan's natural disaster on friday their main wars were about ten other tsunami which could hear the varicose or the one which could be more furious more strong one but what they're worried now is about a possible radioactive contamination we saw residents who were going to poor mrs who came in. searching for their own geiger counters to imagine the radiation levels and. that which is actually quite hard to do on a weekend unless you work in the hospitals a nurse or as a doctor and you while emergency officials are saying that they will keep the public updated on the latest and say that there will be enough time to vacate if

necessary now for a cause reports of weather forecast. for those who live on the coral islands which is just several miles away from japan's coast we know that it was eleven thousand people have been already vacated to safety from the areas which could be flooded and rescuers are urging local residents to move deeper inland and to shelter at about the sea levels. will wilson all from the fisherman that despite reports had been saying that waves did not reach heights evolve a meter around the curial arlen's we know that the waves were as high as three meters on saturday morning. ok the region has had experience with natural disasters before what is its track record in dealing with such disasters. indeed it is so highly region has a very bad record in terms of say speak of t.v.

it's the most dangerous part of russia because of a constant. danger of earthquakes and it was where some of the world's most disastrous and gruesome all quakes took place so the supply line for example in somalia the most disastrous earthquakes in the hundred years took place in one thousand nine hundred ninety five which claimed the lives of over two thousand people and it was of the same four as. like the recent one in japan and also in come chad. when it was the soviet union in one thousand nine hundred fifty two there was a similar. quake it's also worth mentioning that consequences could be very severe for the local economy this is highly region is it collapsing economy which relies the resource economy relying on oil and gas resources and supply line is home to two major oil and gas these sorts of one and two ok well thank you very much r.t.d. thought that you have given us the latest from russia for east. and i were getting

more reports trickling in that the roof of the nuclear reactor has reportedly collapsed while japanese state t.v. has shown pictures of an apparent explosion at the fukushima nuclear power plant but the latest that we're hearing is that the roof of the reactor has collapsed a radiation levels there are said to have increased rapidly and the plant has been facing a meltdown after the eight point nine magnitude earthquake hit the country on a friday well let's go back to work or a sponsor. who is in a moscow for us hi there again ivor can you just give us the latest from tokyo. as you said there the latest is that they've said that the roof the roof of the reactor has actually collapsed and that's again suggesting that there has been this explosion we've seen the pictures the explosion it's very powerful there that plume

of smoke is rising into the sky and also we've heard that one of the four walls of the reactor has also collapsed now the government is clearly worried that of the potential new chance a nuclear meltdown may outgrow a reactor so they've just issued a. warning in advice to people if they are in the area in a facility to cover their mouth and nose so as to not. inhale any of the radioactive particles also they should cover up any exposed skin and then tap water as well at the moment such is that level of precaution here another report just been issued on japanese television is that. officials measure the level of radiation at the entrance of the plant about two and a half hours ago and they said that if you spend an hour there and you it's receive as much radiation as you would you normally in a year in that time to begin with they were saying that the radiation levels were twenty times the normal level western media after that actually were saying the

radiation had risen to a thousand times the normal level ok i've just tell us a given all that's happening what are the possible consequences is of radiation really the main and the number one concern of the government right now there in tokyo. it seems like you've given. advice and health warning to people nationwide even they've evacuated people from the area fifty one thousand in the three kilometer radius of those nuclear reactor in fukushima. and that's just one hundred sixty miles north of tokyo so it's actually surprisingly close to the very small country doesn't it takes just a couple of hours to get across most of the country trains but here in the capital the situation the yelling on the ground is. essentially eerily quiet people are around but that's the reason why it's pretty as you may expect more seems the

streets are empty million people have left already. ok well thank you very much ivor for the latest from tokyo at the moment and now again just to remind you we are breaking news we have these this hour at least four people have been injured following every port of explosion near the a focal shima daiichi power plant in japan that's to the north east of the country and there are fears of a possible meltdown the nuclear safety commission had been fearing a possible meltdown after the cooling systems broke down radioactivity level is said to have risen to twenty times and it's reported that the outer structure of one of four buildings of the plant is no longer there now we have been receiving pictures as you can see on your screens of white smoke coming from the fukushima plant but again it's still unclear where exactly within the plant this is occurred why it has happened of course we have been keeping a close eye since the government's had issued a state of emergency on the plant after cooling systems stopped functioning after

the eight point nine earthquake struck friday afternoon in japan again a white small coming from the plant reports that the roof of the reactor has collapsed there. it's that the outer wall has also collapsed but now we're seeking answers and details as to exactly what has occurred the government spokesman is giving a press conference more fully he will address the issue of pressing matter right now we are all wanting to get information as to exactly what occurred as with regard to fears of radioactivity it has been reported that since friday the level has has risen to up thousand at times more normal than it should be well this has caused the government to issue a state of emergency you have evacuations reportedly around fifty one thousand residents within the immediate vicinity of the plants have been evacuated now here

this is a plant operated by tokyo electric power company they have a six units there and the northeast of the country now they have shut down the plants after the earthquake hit the eight point nine earthquake hits however the reactor of score is still hot and that's the fear the fear of explosions and now we're seeing smoke for of a report of explosion this is caused by a cooling system and not working so again the latest that we're getting for people reportedly reportedly injured from this blast now once again just reminded you know the prime minister of japan the clown is not ruling out a radiation leak from fukushima number two that is another unit within this very close by to the plant that we can see now on our screens worries of the government of the radiation levels affecting people according to work correspondent who's on

the ground for us people have been asked to keep masks on to prevent themselves from inhaling the chemicals in the air that result from this leak in the nuclear power plant the latest we're getting is and they. splosion has occurred at the fukushima plant is again to the northeast of the capital if we remember the eight point nine earthquake that struck japan on friday is to the north east coast the north east coast of the country so this is very very close to that area which is why the result which is why there is a resulting malfunction of the cooling system now japan is still reeling from the devastation and still more devastation caused by the effects of first the earthquake there the massive tsunami some reporting up to seven meters high a wall of water just eating up everything in its path the devastation caused by that the casualties are still being counted now official official reports put the number at seven hundred but we're getting other reports that it could be as high as

a thousand or even more because there are people reported the missing and are feared dead so it has been a chain reaction of events starting from an earthquake friday that have japan two forty six zero local time five forty six am a g m t followed by a massive tsunami of the coastal areas and then now the latest is an explosion at the fukushima plant which has been in a state of emergency well let's get more on the earthquake and its effects from dr robert gibbs a research associate professor of nuclear history and culture at hiroshima peace institute or the latest reports are that we're getting is that there has been an explosion at fukushima number one a nuclear power plant what could this mean we still have to get details about what could this mean. well i'm not an expert on nuclear power but having studied the history of these incidents in the past i know that at this reactor there had been

attempts to reduce the pressure inside the reactor core and to cool the reactor to avoid. to see an explosion as we saw in that building obviously indicates failure in those efforts. clearly the situation in this reactor is not under control that there is an explosion of that sort that building or so it would . it's hard to say exactly what it reflects but it would certainly indicate the likelihood of a partial meltdown in the potentially already of four meltdown ok well we are still of course getting the details so we can speculate but as much impact that we have right now what do you think caused the explosion because we have been reporting that it's the cooling system that's not working and this is this has been the cause the root cause of the worry of the government to keep that you know the temperatures are going at very high levels is this if you think this could be the

reason why an explosion of course is this what a meltdown is what is a meltdown. well i'm not down here is the you know order to keep the fuel of the nuclear power plant cool that fuel is cooled with which water the water heat of the reactor rods will. boil that water and that will escape steam which will be somewhat radioactive so new water needs to be continually pumped through in order to call these rods down what's baled in these in these reactors is the cooling system because it's it's a dependency on electricity in order to run the cooling system so with no access to electricity their backup generators that were initially there at these plants failed because of the tsunami and the earthquake and so generators battery and generators have been brought in in order to pump the water and call the fuel rods it appears as though they were having trouble maintaining the flow of water to cool

these rods and if the water boils away and the rods are exposed and the rods will begin to melt and the fuel will begin to melt down when this happens they'll be a much larger release of radiation into the environment than is released by steam the water boiling away so it would appear given the fact that there was an explosion in this building that the likelihood that there is remaining water cooling these rods would have to be very slim at this point well you're saying that the a solution that they had implemented initially is to try to cool that cool down the reactors but it's not working so what other ways are there is that the only way how could they stop this situation from getting any worse. they need water to cool it and it's just a matter of how to how to make that system operate in order to make that system operate they need energy problem with these plants is that the access to electricity was cut so there was no electricity to power the cooling systems the

backup system that is the general. generators failed because either of the earthquake or the tsunami perhaps rendering the generators in operable backup systems is to have battery driven generators which will then work the cooling system and cool and continue to pump water in to keep the rods in water and to keep the rods cool down so ultimately what has to happen is that this water does need to flow to keep these routes cooled down so it's simply a matter of how to get sufficient energy of the system to make the system operable so i know that i did batteries and generators have been brought in but it appears as though the situation was not very easy to control and one of the worrying pains is that there are similar problems in keeping the cooling water flowing in several areas of the reactors remember in each of these sites there are a number of reactors at fukushima number one where the explosion happened there are six nuclear reactors and if we are to which is ten miles away there are four more

reactors there's also. only go. which is further north from there there's three reactors so this is a problem that they've had with a number of the reactors to keep the coolant water flowing so we've got this of the explosion at this reactor they still face a problem of getting sufficient electricity to run the only systems that many of the other reactors which is why there are evacuations around one or two other reactors as well so my situation has not appeared the situation appears to be deteriorating ok i just want to ask you about of a report we're getting just to give us an idea for those of us have not seen a natural a reactor not the roof of the reactor has said to collapse and what does this mean this is me that's a little breach of the facility what's how is the roof structured in relation to the the actual reactor. i don't know the designs as i say i'm not an expert on nuclear power plants so i don't know the designs of the specific plant but the there is a containment vessel around these reactors unlike the reactor

a treadmill and some of the chernobyl type design. so i can say from watching that explosion whether or not that containment has been breached or not if there containment has been breached and that would allow for an easy escape radiation into the environment if that containment is not breached then even with enough there may be an ability to contain the contamination at the local site so this is one of the things we'll learn in the next few hours as to how severe this explosion was and what facilities at the reactor be left intact and which were breached ok well now an emergency situation has been declared at two nuclear facilities and five reactors were how dire is the situation what is your assessment do you see a repeat of chernobyl or the questionable catastrophe in japan how would we how do we look at this situation unfolding. we look at this situation it's a very dire situation unfolding and we hope that it can be resolved and that enough resources and electricity can be brought to bear in order to get all that water

flowing and make sure that those reactor cores are cooled down. the grim situation would be if if this has been a partial meltdown or a more serious note that is contained on you this one reactor the worst case scenario would be that similar situations could happen at another reactor were two and in a sense these reactors are much larger than the reactors in terms of they were out of fuel and electricity that generate so the potential for larger releases of radiation is there the situation is not under control and of course a natural disaster as the concern would definitely be the lives of people the safety of people radiation levels are said to be growing rapidly because how dangerous is it for people locally especially those within the vicinity of the a facility. well that's unknowable without more precise information about exactly what is happening exactly what the radiation levels are but clearly any exposure to

radiation at all is bad for the human body and bad for human health. there's been warnings already on japanese television and in the region to take really take precautions to minimize exposure to radiation and people are now being told to stay in their homes rather than to evacuate which would be an indicator of the presence of radiation in the atmosphere but it's not a simple matter to keep radiation outside of the house although it will minimize exposures so the people in those areas and the people in the downwind areas are certainly in significant risk having exposures that could lead to health and ones depending on the size of the of the releases and the amount of radiation that enters the atmosphere the nearby atmosphere there's a possibility the areas around the plants could be left. could be left much like the area around turmoil as areas that wouldn't and it wouldn't be entered that's a worst case scenario if that's the case to contain that area to

a small area possible his goal so people there people in those areas should all of the guidances of the government officials but they should definitely take steps to minimize their exposure in any way to radiation people what about the people of the rest of the role for that matter going back again that's i think your noble in the of the effect of the radiation spread from mouth what about in the place in japan do we see that spreading from oz you were mentioning a downwind how would that affect the rest of the world. well if there's a significant release of radiation into the atmosphere that can easily go into the upper atmosphere and spread. in the upper atmosphere around the globe this kind of radiation will typically come down from the upper atmosphere with precipitation like rain or snow which makes if there is a very very significant release into the atmosphere people in people certainly

in the jet in japan and in the region fear in attention even across the pacific ocean would want to avoid exposure of rain over the next week or two but this is a worst case scenario and there's no guarantee that anything like that would happen but that is what happened in chernobyl there was radioactive particles coming down and raining in areas in north america and certainly drought asia immediately after chernobyl disaster ok well if we just go back to the massive earthquake that struck japan yesterday that's friday afternoon now japan's earth. that is the buildings they have been designed to withstand earthquakes considering japan is on the cusp of a very active pop tectonic plate thank more could have been done in terms of infrastructure to prevent. hastert the effects of a disaster like this in terms of damage to infrastructure or lives saved. well certainly it's easy to see that more could be done but there is no threshold to

that dilemma for example there may have been a nine point three earthquake you know it's possible that there could be a ten point zero earthquake so it's an ensemble to design these plants to an unlimited level of safety given that they are always subject to natural disasters in which case the stress put on the plant by the disasters exceeds its design of the plants themselves and so therefore it's it's essential to be aware that this kind of danger will always exist and when you're dealing with one of the things i would say about nuclear power is that when you're dealing with materials that remain toxic for periods of potentially thousands of years it's the dangers are are significant in a dangerous and need to be understood over a long period of time and not just in the short term in terms of generating electricity so well more could be done and certainly there's no way you could reach where you would say that

a plant is now beyond the possibility of damage from natural disasters there's always that potential ok well i just let me allow me to pick your brain here a little we know that japan again as i mentioned earlier is within the ring of fire the massive tectonic plates and they are very prone to earthquakes we all know that but you know building a nuclear power plants was that putting putting the country at risk knowing that earthquakes happen occur. frequently in japan it was not too much of a risk to have nuclear power plants in the country. but in my judgment i believe it's too much of a risk. anywhere. judgment was made at the time because japan has no energy resources it has no color or oil in order to achieve independence nuclear power was one way to achieve energy independence and similar path. the logic is followed by france which has the highest amount of its electricity generated by nuclear power

plants. it's in living in an earthquake zone no matter what you put there there is a danger of course there could be explosions took the explosions all generated plants so there is always this danger. and one of the reasons that i'm opposed to nuclear power is because these dangers then entail toxins and poisons which on our own lives the damage of explosions or the kind of incident that can happen when there's an earthquake you find at the trauma and health threat will last far beyond the incident itself so to me it's an especially serious danger that would preclude putting nuclear power plants in earthquake zones but i would say that for similar reasons there's arguments against putting them in anywhere ok well just a bit more information you were you kept mentioning the health effects of very high level stuff radiation.